P.S.: Don't Forget to Include This in Your Copy

One of the most ven­er­a­ble and com­mon ele­ments of good saleslet­ters, fol­low­ing the head­line, is the post­script or “P.S.” at the end.

The end of every great sales let­ter should be capped with a strong P.S. We are often told that the P.S. is the sec­ond most read part of a saleslet­ter, because after read­ing the head­line many peo­ple tend to scroll or jump to the bottom.

It’s like the “sec­ond head­line,” so to speak.

This is par­tic­u­larly true when we know that most peo­ple tend to read the head­line or the “Dear Friend” salu­ta­tion, then turn to the clos­ing of the let­ter to see who signed it or who is it from. Partly out of curios­ity. Partly to jus­tify read­ing it in the first place.

Includ­ing a P.S. in your copy may not always be nec­es­sary. I’ve seen some great, proven saleslet­ters that did not have any post­scripts at all. But if you do include one, don’t add it just for the sake of adding one. Make sure it does the job.

In fact, you shouldn’t use a P.S. the way it’s sup­posed to be used…

In tra­di­tional let­ter writ­ing, a P.S. is an after­thought. An addi­tional, inci­den­tal, or for­got­ten piece of infor­ma­tion. Hence the mean­ing of the word “post script,” as in, “after writing.”

And the rea­son it exists is because, in the old days of hand­writ­ten or type­writ­ten let­ters, where you couldn’t go back to edit their let­ter or insert new pieces of infor­ma­tion, the P.S. would allow the author to add final bits of infor­ma­tion after the let­ter was finished.

Back then, we did not have the lux­ury of real-​​time edit­ing or cor­rec­tion fluid as we do today, so adding a P.S. was com­mon prac­tice. Now, it is no longer necessary.

But saleslet­ters keep using them, and they work extremely well, in large part because they look more per­sonal and infor­mal, and less like a pro­fes­sional, for­mal sales pitch.

How­ever, with saleslet­ters, a post­script is not really a place to intro­duce new pieces of infor­ma­tion — unless those pieces are sup­ported or dis­cussed in the let­ter, or meant to arouse curios­ity, forc­ing the reader back into the copy.

But it is a per­fect tool to get the reader to take action.

As the last oppor­tu­nity to con­vert your reader into a buyer, the P.S. is a final state­ment that sup­ports the copy that came before, reminds or rein­forces an under­ly­ing prin­ci­ple of the let­ter, or empha­sizes the need to take action quickly.

To that end, it can be a great place for adding new, undis­closed infor­ma­tion, such as a few sur­prises or twists, in order to clinch the deal. (I’ll come back to this in a moment.)

But the eas­i­est and most com­mon use for a P.S. is to pro­vide a brief sum­mary of the let­ter, reit­er­ate its main pur­pose or objec­tive, or restate any of its key points, such as the big idea, the com­pelling promise, the major ben­e­fits, or the call to action.

This fol­lows with the three major steps in deliv­er­ing pre­sen­ta­tions. And what is a sales let­ter at its core but a writ­ten pre­sen­ta­tion? As a refresher, the three major steps are:

1. Tell them what you’re going to tell them.
2. Tell them.
3. Tell them what you told them.

Your P.S. can be part of that impor­tant final step.

Specif­i­cally, you’ve already told them every­thing in your sales let­ter, espe­cially if it’s long copy. Now it’s time to choose the one aspect you believe is most likely to be hold­ing them back from buy­ing after read­ing all the way through, and to resolve it.

A strong P.S. does not beg, but rather invites the reader to take the final step before pur­chas­ing. It’s a strong and clear state­ment that con­tains the final call to action.

You can use the P.S. to recap the entirety of your offer. Tell them again what your offer includes, list the impor­tant ben­e­fits, add up the dol­lar value (includ­ing the value of your bonuses), and out­line the extras to rein­force the value of the offer.

An effec­tive tech­nique is to restate your head­line, or some­thing impor­tant you’ve expressed in the head­line. You won’t nec­es­sar­ily copy the head­line ver­ba­tim, but present the same infor­ma­tion but para­phrase it in a benefit-​​driven manner.

For exam­ple, your head­line says:

“The Acci­den­tal Weight-​​Loss Dis­cov­ery of a Jug­gling Career Mom Who Lost Six Inches of Baby Fat Around Her Waist­line With­out Any Exer­cise of Diets — In Just a Few Weeks!”

The post­script can then say:

“P.S.: If you’re a career mom or about to become one, and you’re con­cerned about unwanted, stub­born baby fat, then this prod­uct is per­fect for you. Imag­ine turn­ing heads as you melt away those few extra inches amaz­ingly fast — in just a few short weeks! — while avoid­ing exer­cises or diets you don’t have time for, anyway.”

Also, using the “oh, by the way” approach is an effec­tive one. This resem­bles the orig­i­nal pur­pose of a P.S., since it is indeed intended to be an after­thought or an impor­tant piece of infor­ma­tion one has for­got­ten to men­tion after the let­ter was written.

That’s why they are per­fect places, not only to add addi­tional infor­ma­tion we failed to include in our let­ter, but also to use this seem­ingly acci­den­tal omis­sion to high­light a spe­cific piece of infor­ma­tion we want our reader to remem­ber, absorb, and appreciate.

So while you can use a post­script to restate the pri­mary ben­e­fit of your prod­uct or ser­vice, you can also use it to intro­duce a com­pletely new sur­prise ben­e­fit — such as one or more spe­cial, “last-​​minute” bonuses you are includ­ing with your offer.

Thus, a P.S. is a great way to strengthen the offer and “sweeten the deal.”

How­ever, one of the most pow­er­ful P.S. tech­niques is to high­light the sense of urgency — either by cre­at­ing or increas­ing the scarcity fac­tor not men­tioned in the let­ter, or by restat­ing or empha­siz­ing it if one was already mentioned.

This way, the P.S. prompts the strag­gler to take imme­di­ate action, whether it’s buy­ing your offer now, or at least going back and read­ing the let­ter before it’s too late.

Nev­er­the­less, let’s not for­got the proof ele­ment. In fact, a post­script is a per­fect oppor­tu­nity to increase buyer con­fi­dence, reduce skep­ti­cism, and lower resistance.

At this point, you want to alle­vi­ate any lin­ger­ing doubts. Express­ing you under­stand your reader’s hes­i­tancy — espe­cially once they’ve read to that point but have yet to take action, which is a great indi­ca­tor — can be a bridge to over­com­ing their final objection.

Adding another proof ele­ment may be your cho­sen tac­tic in this case.

Per­son­ally, this is my favorite. I love using P.S.‘s to enhance the cred­i­bil­ity of my offer in some way, per­haps by includ­ing an addi­tional tes­ti­mo­nial or endorse­ment, or by adding or restat­ing the guar­an­tee. Per­haps a newer and even stronger guarantee.

What you are look­ing to do with your P.S. is iden­tify the one objec­tion you fore­see as being the key to hold­ing your reader back from order­ing. If you decide on using a tes­ti­mo­nial, then choose the one that inher­ently answers this lin­ger­ing objection.

To han­dle this objec­tion fur­ther, a post­script may be the place you repeat an impor­tant or unique aspect of your offer. Since this is what sets your prod­uct or ser­vice apart from every­thing else in the mar­ket, it may be impor­tant to point it out to your reader again.

How­ever, in doing so it’s best to para­phrase as to make it eas­ier for the reader to under­stand and truly appre­ci­ate its mean­ing, and make it appear less repetitive.

In other words, reword the orig­i­nal infor­ma­tion that was pre­vi­ously intro­duced as to specif­i­cally deal with the objec­tion. Ide­ally, it will be the last piece of the puz­zle your reader needs to push them over the fence and make the deci­sion to buy.

Finally, a proven tech­nique is to include more than one post­script (e.g., “P.P.S.” and “P.P.P.S.”), and using them with a vari­ety of dif­fer­ent meth­ods dis­cussed in this article.

If you decide on more than one P.S., then you should stick to three. Why? It’s because stud­ies and split-​​tests show that, in a triad of P.S.‘s, peo­ple tend to read, remem­ber, and respond to the sec­ond one more than they do the first and last ones.

In other words, include your biggest ben­e­fit, a major sell­ing point, or an ele­ment you want your read­ers to focus on the most in the sec­ond or mid­dle P.S.

Bot­tom line, try adding one to your saleslet­ter. As with all aspects of the sales let­ter that come before, you will have to exper­i­ment with your P.S. until it is just right. It can take a while to adjust the angle and the word­ing until it reaches the peak of effectiveness.

Though shorter and less intense than most other aspects of your sales let­ter, no less care should be taken with the craft­ing of this aspect. Con­sid­er­ing its posi­tion and pur­pose, it’s a fea­ture you don’t want to for­get to include in your sales copy.

About the Author

Last 5 Posts By Michel Fortin

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